The goods deficit decreased $2.8 billion in December to $84.2 billion. Next release: March 5, 2021. The highest cover ratios — the value of exports divided by the value of imports, expressed as a percentage — for trade in services were recorded for Turkey (209.8 %) and India (164.5 %), suggesting that the relative importance of service exports was particularly high for each of these economies, in particular, transport services, travel services and personal, cultural and recreational services in Turkey and telecoms, computer and information services in India. International trade in services takes place when a service is supplied in any of the following modes: from one economy to another (services cross the border); within an economy to service a consumer of another economy (consumer crosses the border); or through the presence of natural persons of one economy in another economy (supplier crosses the border) (United Nations et al., 2012). Statistics on international trade in services. International trade in services is subject, in general, to lot of restrictions. In 2018, the highest specialisation ratio for the EU-28, both for exports and for imports, was recorded for personal, cultural and recreational services. some services are non-transportable and can only be consumed at their point-of-sale requiring either producer or consumer to cross a border in order to be exported; many countries regulate areas like professional services — for example, the legal profession, tax consultants or accountants — which are bound by national legislation; there are a range of services (at least in Europe) which are largely supplied by the public sector, for example, health or education services and trade in these areas is often restricted; services cover a heterogeneous range of products/activities that are difficult to encapsulate within a simple definition, often these are tailored specifically to a client’s needs and so unlike goods, they have a tendency not to be homogeneous, mass-produced items; as such they are sometimes difficult to separate from the goods with which they may be associated or bundled. We show that even in a regional grouping that has done much to promote a single market in services–the EU–there remains considerable heterogeneity in trade costs across countries. International trade largely relates to physical goods. Trade costs in services have remained relatively steady over the last ten years, whereas trade costs in goods have fallen overall at an impressive rate. one-tenth one-eighth one-fourth one-third B. The EU-28’s imports were highest for other business services (EUR 213 billion), which accounted for 29.2 % of the total value of services imported into the EU-28 in 2018. During the same period, the value of EU-28 imports of services grew between 2010 and 2015, before dropping back in 2016 and 2017; a return to growth was observed in 2018. The five other services where the EU-28 recorded the highest global levels of exports in 2018 were: transport services; telecommunication, computer and information services; insurance and pension services; manufacturing services; personal, cultural and recreational services. The United States ran the largest trade surplus for trade in services among the leading trading nations that are shown in Table 2 — some EUR 220 billion in 2018— while the EU-28 had the second largest surplus (EUR 190 billion); aside from these, there were only three other countries among those shown in Table 2 that recorded trade surpluses for international trade in services in 2018, namely, India, Hong Kong and Turkey. This indicator is measured in million USD and percentage of GDP for exports, imports and net trade. The seasonally adjusted balance on goods and services surplus increased $3,009m to $10,142m in January. Nowhere was this more apparent than in China, as imports were more than four times as high in 2018 as in 2010 while the value of services exports were more than twice as high; services exports from Singapore also doubled during this period, while such exports from India nearly doubled. In Africa, they increased moderately, by 2.7 per cent, whereas developed and transition economies recorded considerable growth, of 4.4 and 5.3 per cent, respectively. With US$876 billion worth of services sold internationally, the United States of America remained the world’s leading exporter, accounting for 14 per cent of global services exports. Statistics on the international supply of services by mode of supply are being developed primarily to meet the needs of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) trade negotiators and analysts. While international trade has existed throughout history (for example Uttarapatha, Silk Road, Amber Road, scramble for Africa, … The EU-28 had the highest value of exports for more than half of the service categories shown (7 out of the 12). In 2018, services accounted for an average share of 22.4 % of the world’s trade in goods and services; this could be compared with a share of 19.6 % some eight years earlier, confirming that services were a growing part of world trade. All top five services exporters from the developing world were Asian. In 2018, EU-28 extra-EU trade in services accounted for 29.7 % of the total value of trade in goods and services. Trade. The production chains for these goods and services are becoming increasingly complex and global. China had a sizeable trade deficit for services in 2018. At the Services differ from goods in respect of the immediacy of the relationship between supplier and consumer. The second wave started after the Second World War, and is still continuing. data value is forecasted, provisional or estimated and is therefore likely to change. Trade in goods and services is defined as the transactions in goods and services between residents and non-residents. Services are an increasingly important part of the global economy and play a central role in each of the EU Member States. During the period from 2010 to 2018, the value of EU-28 exports of services increased every year apart from a very small decrease in 2016, rising from EUR 567 billion in 2010 to EUR 919 billion in 2018 (an overall increase of 62.1 %). Services trade accounts for nearly 40 percent of world trade (value-added) That services trade accounted for a quarter of total world exports on a gross basis understates the services sector’s importance to trade. Between 2010 and 2018, China recorded the fastest growth for trade in services. Statistics are required to support negotiations and to monitor the impact of services trade agreements. The share of services export in total goods and services export has doubled from 17 percent in 1970 to over 32 percent by 2014. The services sector contributes considerably more (than the industrial economy) to gross domestic product (GDP) and employment within the EU-28, accounting for approximately three quarters of total economic activity. For comparison, the shares of the United States were 19.8 % for exports and 13.5 % of imports, while those for China were 5.3 % for exports and 11.7 % for imports (see Table 1). More than half of this trade takes place with other developing economies, with an increasing share of trade in manufactured g oods. In most countries, such trade represents a significant share of gross domestic product (GDP). Note that more detailed information is collected for 97 different services and that these data are available in Eurostat’s online database for more in-depth analyses. Overview: In October 2020 Philippines exported $6.27B and imported $8.52B, resulting in a negative trade balance of $2.25B.Between October 2019 and October 2020 the exports of Philippines have decreased by $-59.8M (-0.94%) from $6.33B to $6.27B, while imports decreased by $-1.54B (-15.3%) from $10.1B to $8.52B. The share of Africa's merchandise exports within the continent has nearly doubled, jumping from 10.3 of total exports (by value) in 2010 to 19.6 per cent in 2017. Within the EU-28, the relative share of services in total trade for goods and services also rose between 2010 and 2018, from 26.8 % to 29.7 %, as international transactions for services became increasingly important to the performance of the EU economy. China, the leading exporter among developing economies, ranked fifth overall, with US$283 billion of services sold. Although there are several likely channels that are responsible for driving up demand for world trade in services, none is as instrumental as advances in technological change. Net trade in goods and services (BoP, current US$) from The World Bank: Data Learn how the World Bank Group is helping countries with COVID-19 (coronavirus). In many economies of Europe, the Caribbean and South-Eastern Asia, services exports played an especially prominent role. Note: The shaded area indicates UNCTAD nowcasts. The main methodological references used for the production of statistics on international trade in services are: All of the international trade in services statistics presented in this online publication are based upon the BPM6 methodology, adopted by the EU Member States from reference year 2013 onwards. As of 2013 world trade in goods has been valued at more than US$18.5 trillion, while trade in services has accounted for almost US$5 trillion. The information presented in Table 5 reverses the focus of the analysis, detailing for each country/geographical aggregate where its relative trade specialisation (among the 12 service categories which form the basis of this analysis) lies.